The calls of lawyer, activist, and writer Seyran Ates for a sexual revolution in the heterogeneous Muslim world may surprise many, particularly when the movement is commonly associated with free love, hippies, and public nudity. In a recent interview with German magazine Spiegel, Ates begins with discussing what she means by this and her experiences […]

This is my second post covering the Globe and Mail‘s series on women in Kandahar, Afghanistan.  My first post examined the title and introductions to the project; this post will look at the online footage of the ten interviews that were conducted for the series.  There is more to the project than what is covered […]

This post is the first of two that will analyze the recent Globe and Mail series on women in Kandahar, Afghanistan.  While the series included segments in print and broadcast media, my focus here is on the multimedia online section, accessible through the Globe and Mail‘s website.  Today’s post will be an overview of some […]

This was originally published at my personal site. Phyllis Chesler and Naomi Wolf have gotten themselves into a battle royale over…the veil. And everyone seems to be concerned what two privileged non-Muslim white ladies think about this subject. Funny, considering Chesler picks fights all the time, and no one seemed to be interested in an […]

“Sara, I could never get with a Muslim girl, how do they make you guys so unattainable?” a womanizing co-worker once asked me in all seriousness. There is nothing that I love more than a man that sees “ethnic” women as another check mark on an international bingo card.  I’ve heard a number of men […]

Since 1994, South Africa celebrates National Women’s Day every year on the 9th of August, and more generally the whole month has become one in which the woes of women are highlighted and tribute is paid to their outstanding achievements. The occasion marks a march led by a 20,000-strong gathering of women on August 9, […]

Some articles are fairly subtle in their Islamophobia, others less so. Judy Bachrach’s article “Twice Branded: Western Women, Muslim Lands,” starts off badly and then to proceeds to elicit gasps with its sheer awfulness. It even cites Not Without My Daughter as an accurate depiction of life for most Muslim women. Yes, really. The title […]

This was written by Allison McCarthy and originally appeared at GlobalComment. Tina Brown’s ploys for self-promotion are numerous, but her latest piece, along with a follow-up interview on CNN, takes the cake. Brown, former editor for noted U.S. magazines such as Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and Talk, has always maintained some problematic notions of […]

This originally appeared on Safiya’s blog Outlines. A lot of the discourse of Muslim women both here and elsewhere concerns the battle to speak for ourselves. To define our religion, our beliefs on our terms, without the headpatting and correcting of outsiders. Fatemeh’s post at Altmuslimah gives a thorough outline of the usual mistakes made […]

Sophie Ashraf, also known as The Burkha Rapper, is an Indian Muslim female rapper for whom Muslim identity seems central to her art. This comes across clearly in her following statement on the Blind Boys website: Its like when you really like a band, you wear T-shirts of that band, Well we really, really like […]